Becoming a Sangoma: Religious Anthropological Field-Work in Francistown, Botswana

Binsbergen, W.M.J. van

doi:10.2307/1581194

Cited by 16 publications

(9 citation statements)

References 3 publications

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“…This kind of experiential ethnography was a clear precursor to reflexivity in anthropology and could shed some light on how the religious manifested itself in fieldwork. Various accounts, mainly by secular anthropologists, discuss how religious phenomena encountered in field situations also infiltrated the secular self, especially by describing their direct experiences of the religious [24][25][26][27][28].…”

Section: Religion and Secularism In Anthropologymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…While in principle such a move may be valuable, we believe that it is important to engage with theology critically, since the discipline also shares the same Judeo-Christian heritage as anthropology, and thus has a distinctly Western and Christian intellectual and epistemological tradition. Van Binsbergen ( [27], pp. 336-37), for example, lamented the almost total lack of African theology, especially in its non-Christian forms, a situation that does not seem to have changed considerably since he wrote.…”

Section: Towards a Reflexive Postsecularismmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Occupying the Ontological Penumbra: Towards a Postsecular and Theologically Minded Anthropology

Merz

2017

Religions

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Abstract:In the wake of the postsecular turn, we propose to reappraise both the religious as studied in anthropology and how anthropologists who have religious or spiritual interests can contribute to an emerging postsecular anthropology. Such an anthropology recognizes the failure of secularization theory to dissolve the dichotomy between the religious and the secular. We propose that as anthropologists we consciously occupy the ontological penumbra, an ambiguous and plural space in which we engage with various counterparts, both human and nonhuman. This means that we have to be open to the real possibility of the existence of gods, spirits, and other nonhuman entities. These should not only be treated as subjects of study, but also recognized as valid counterparts with whom we can engage in the ethnographic encounter. While this necessitates relinquishing the former privileged position of secular and Western epistemology, it opens up the discipline to a potentially unprecedented ethnographic productivity that is epistemologically and ontologically innovative. Without neglecting its secular heritage, such a theologically minded postsecular anthropology places anthropology in a better position to explore what it is to be human, especially in terms of understanding religious and spiritual experiences.

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Section: Religion and Secularism In Anthropologymentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Towards a Reflexive Postsecularismmentioning

confidence: 99%

Occupying the Ontological Penumbra: Towards a Postsecular and Theologically Minded Anthropology

Merz

2017

Religions

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“…The diviner's keen perceptiveness is an innate gift (yibutukulu), inherited through the uterine line. In case a young uterine descendent of a recently trespassed diviner repeatedly suffers from epileptic attacks, sleepwalking and trance-possession of a particular pattern, they may be attributed to the spirit of divination (ngoombu), and call for the initiation in the art of shamanic-like divination (see also van Binsbergen 1991Binsbergen , 2003Binsbergen , 2013. The maternal uncle and the responsible of the household may then induce the afflicted "to undergo the gestational seclusion" (-buusa khita) under the guidance of a master diviner.…”

Section: Divinatory Etiologymentioning

confidence: 99%

Body and Affect in the Intercultural Encounter

Devisch¹

2017

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Body and affect in the intercultural encounter last four months of my early fieldwork among the Yakaphones. Currently, her infinite care and that of professionals has enabled this much-delayed publication. Their help contributes to my ability to surpass the progressive multiple sclerosis, which disables me greatly, by providing a fruitful harvest that will hopefully prove to be boundless, as my Yakaphone friends wish me. Chapters 1 and 6 are original works, written for this book. Sarah Jacobs translated the first part of chapter 1 from French, as Claire Chevalier did for chapter 7. Bregt Brosens volunteered to edit the bibliographic references. Furthermore, the following chapters are rewrites of previously published essays:

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“…Similar eccentricities and instabilities of cognitive and practical believing might apply to anthropologists, while specific theological forms of believing and performing rituals are a cultural work of the religious people with whom we temporarily live. To impugn anthropologists who are reluctant to become religious in the field is to forget that religious assimilation is often perceived as an achievement, a gift bestowed by ancestors or gods (Binsbergen 1991), a talent revealed through years of training , and not just an intellectual and professional decision to believe. Furthermore, is 'belief' such a secret and peculiar state of the human mind that it takes a mystic to understand a mystic?…”

Section: Suspension Of Disbelief and Performancementioning

confidence: 99%

Confessional anthropology

Oustinova-Stjepanovic¹

2015

Social Analysis

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Drawing on my experience of a Muslim version of exorcism in urban Macedonia, this article continues a methodological discussion of the implications of being an atheist anthropologist when researching religion, a situation known as 'methodological atheism'. Methodological atheism is often linked to the problem of suspending one's intellectual disregard of people's religions as delusions. This article will argue instead that there are barriers to participation in religious rituals that are not covered by questions of disbelief. The notion of 'dispositional atheism' is discussed against the backdrop of the anxieties, uncertainties, and inhibitions experienced by an atheist anthropologist caught up in a moment of religious intensity."If one has no faith, is there any reason why one should be interested?" (Berger 2004: 1). This question springs from two common assumptions-that theology is interesting only for believers, while anthropology is inevitably a non-theistic discipline that consists of secular endeavors of non-believers to "explain [religion] away" (Binsbergen 1991: 336). However, within theology, conceptualized as an established academic field, there are uncertainties as to whether theology is indeed a confessional discipline that attracts only religious people (Bowie 1998). Scholars have been asking if, as an exercise in philosophical thinking, theologies can be understood across the faith-non-faith divide. For example, can an atheist study theology (Cush 2009)? Is a theologian ill-equipped to undertake a non-confessional study of religion (Yong 2012: 18)? These concerns about subjective religiosity or the non-religion of a researcher are analogous to the questions raised in anthropology about its methodological and epistemological foundations as a secular social science (Bielo 2014: 7). So, is anthropology of religion a confessional discipline of a kind? Does an anthropologist have to 'believe' to carry out research among seriously religious people? This article Confessional Anthropology | 115 revisits the debates about how the atheism of anthropology and of anthropologists enables or impedes ethnographic research and the production of anthropological knowledge.

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Becoming a Sangoma: Religious Anthropological Field-Work in Francistown, Botswana

Cited by 16 publications

References 3 publications

Occupying the Ontological Penumbra: Towards a Postsecular and Theologically Minded Anthropology

Occupying the Ontological Penumbra: Towards a Postsecular and Theologically Minded Anthropology

Body and Affect in the Intercultural Encounter

Confessional anthropology

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